Tennessee Lege Passes 'Fink On Your Professor' Bill To Help Stomp Out 'Divisive' Ideas

Freedom on the march, and carrying a tiki torch.

Last year, Tennessee passed one of those cookie-cutter rightwing bills banning the teaching of "divisive concepts" in higher education — the very same sort of hogwash that's currently under a court injunction in Florida. The law, SB 623 prohibited teaching a whole bunch of very bad ideas, like the concept that "One race or sex is inherently superior or inferior to another race or sex" or the always fun "An individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or another form of psychological distress solely because of the individual's race or sex" — so you can't read about Ruby Bridges,   you . The bill also prohibited "penalizing" students for not endorsing the concepts, because we all know how professors like to demand that students recite from the Maoist catechism.

Previously On Law And Odors

 Georgia Schoolchildren Will Just Have To Learn All History From Confederate Statues 

 Mean Federal Court Still Won't Let Ron DeSantis Cast Woke Demons Out Of Colleges 

 Sixty-Three Years Later, White Mom Finally Gets 'Ruby Bridges' Banned From Elementary School 

It was basically the same list of "divisive concepts" that were forbidden in any number of red states after Fox News panicked everyone about "critical race theory," but now, the Republican supermajority in the Tennessee Legislature wants to make the law even better, because apparently Tennessee hasn't been in the news enough lately.

Rep. John Ragan (R) offered a new bill, HB 1376, to toughen up the existing law, which apparently was too lenient. Ragan explained, in that Newspeak that's doublepluspopular with all your leading fascists these days, that the existing law needs to be made more restrictive, to promote "freedom of expression," and to keep "colleges about advancing knowledge, not about advancing political or social agendas."

To that end, Ragan's bill adds some teeth to the law, adding a provision that would encourage students and staff to report professors who violate the rules, like if they secretly close all the curtains and have students read Ibram X Kendi or The 1619 Project by flashlight.

The bill calls on the Tennessee Higher Education Commission to create a system for concerned students and staff to snitch on professors. All reports would have to be investigated by the commission, complete with a corrective action plan for any violations of the law that are discovered.

Other parts of the bill would require that any student group be given the use of campus facilities for meetings and to invite guest speakers, with no restrictions on political viewpoint whatsoever as long as the meeting is peaceful and nonviolent, so get those invites out to all the Nazis that want to show up.

 Inside Higher Ed reports that state Rep. Justin Jones (D), who was expelled for that one weekend, took Ragan to task during debate on the bill, asking him,

"Do you not believe that college students are mature enough to talk about issues like race and systemic racism, some of the concepts you want to ban and have tried to prohibit being discussed at the college level?" [...]

“I believe in God—all else is settled by facts and data,” Ragan responded.

Jones tried to get a clearer answer, but Ragan repeated his previous very clear statement. Jones then got himself into trouble, the way he always does, that troublemaker:

“This sounds like fascism, this sounds like authoritarianism; this does not sound like democracy or freedom.”

“I think it is shameful what you’re trying to do,” Jones continued saying to Ragan, “and I’m trying to get an answer as to see what is the origin of this bill, but you’re being evasive because I think you don’t even know what the purpose of this bill is—besides to feed into this racist narrative that you’ve been promoting all session.”

House Speaker Cameron Sexton called Jones out of order for making mean personal attacks on poor defenseless Ragan, who just loves God and data, jeez.

State Rep. Justin Pearson, also freshly back from being cancelled by the House, called the bill "deeply concerning," arguing that

"it is continuing a pattern of practice that is harmful to all people," he said. "When you try to control what a person thinks, then you are assuming the role of God rather than allowing freedom of thought."

He said that the list of "divisive concepts" bars discussions on biases, white privilege and racism's role in slavery.

Another Black legislator, state Rep. Harold Love, asked Ragan whether the bill would prohibit a hypothetical academic conference on Black history from being held at a Tennessee university. Ragan offered only the vague assurance that such a conference would be OK as long as attendees "are not required to promote or endorse" any of the divisive concepts, although Crom only knows how that would work in practice. Perhaps all the conference papers would need to be cleared first by Moms for Liberty.

Anyway, the bill passed the House by a 68-26 vote, so who's the racist now, Reps. Jones and Pearson? (All the Republicans, that's who.) The Senate passed it earlier this month, so it's expected to be signed by Gov. Bill Lee, and then everyone in Tennessee colleges and universities will just stop causing a fuss and love America, because it's the law.

[ WBIR-TV / Tennessee HB 1376 / inside Higher Ed ]

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